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Mike Mearls is the Senior Manager for the Dungeons and Dragons Design Team. He's been with D&D publishers Wizards of the Coast (a subsidiary of Hasbro) since 2005, Before that he was a free-lance game writer and designer. In this conversation with Slashdot editor Rob "samzenpus" Rozeboom, he talks about changes in the latest version of D&D and how the company interacts with players. (We'll have some more chat with Mike next week, different wizard time, same wizard channel, so stay tuned.)

This is why you have a real live DM to correct for those times in which it is broken.

Is it possible to, by the letter of the rules, break 3.5? Sure it is. But in my group we have players who're more interested in having fun than in rules-lawyering, and a DM to ensure that that things stay balanced.

A good RPG system doesn't have to be balanced; it just has to be balanced to first order.

Yeah, but D&D's main purpose is a wargaming system. Actual RP is the extreme minority, even in groups that enjoy it. Although I haven't and don't want to try it, I think it's smart of WizCoast to go back to those roots with their newer products. They actually have stuff that is consciously trying to split the wargaming aspect out of D&D. Maybe if that becomes more popular, the RP will have some room to grow?*
*Nah, it'd be the killing blow. But I can dream.

Codemonkey response: you need a single =, no quotes, and to define what enumerated type has a numeric definition of sucks. Or alternatively, single =, double quotes, and fix your variable placement. As it is currently, you are doing a numeric check, followed by checking to see whether that number is also equal to the single character 'sucks' (which is not a single character) and then completely ignoring the result of that check.

Honestly, it's not the versions that I have a problem with, it's that they've converted to an optional content/material publication system, to a required core update system that delivers no new content, just new rules. Wizards seem to have forgotten the value of charm and mystery along the way.

I remember when the problem really began with random miniatures instead of just buying what you need. The whole intent was to FORCE you to buy more to get what you need to play. I jumped ship, and I think lots of other people did too.

I'm not so sure. I have to agree with your assessment; 3.5 to me was the pinnacle of DnD and 4 just turned me off big time.

However, I still didn't jump ship, I've just stayed with 3.5. Technically I play other's products now, such as Arcanna Evolved by Monte Cook and Pathfinder, which are enhancements of the 3.0 and 3.5 editions and to me represent good quality upgrades. So maybe that's jumping ship to go to other D20 products, but I'll admit I'm not jumping ship to any of the other game systems like Whi

Luckily for you, you probably have an imagination and can use the huge number of resources already available for 3.5 and play D&D forever. I happen to play and enjoy 4th edition, but other than the core rule books and a couple updates, I haven't had to get anything new in years, and likely never will.

I still own the first D&D and AD&D first and second edition rules and source books. It was fun playing at the time, but when the third edition came out I decided not participate any longer and went for different systems to spend money on (but continued playing 2nd edition). But it has been several years now since my last rpg session (that was vampire the masquerade).

No, D&D prior to 3.0 was a clusterfuck of shitty rules. We played it because it was what we had always played. 3.0 started over just enough to standardize the system while keeping the essential feel of the game. 3.5 and now Pathfinder have simply carried on the evolution. 4.0 was just a totally different game that had little relation to what came before.

Take off the rose colored glasses. D&D up through 2.5 was not a good system.

I don't know. Every edition has its strengths and weaknesses, but 3.5e was arguably less good than 3e, which in turn fixed a bunch of AD&D 2e's problems but created a whole string of new really bad ones (mostly by removing all caster restrictions while crippling the fighter, ramping up the complexity with feats, and heavy emphasis on the game board), while 2e was just a Bowdlerised version of AD&D 1e, which was in turn Original D&D with all the ambiguity removed for consistent tournament play.

First of all, thank you for doing this interview and releasing it for free for my enjoyment. However, I don't have audio on the computer I'm using right now, so I can't hear it. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I hate watching videos of things that can be communicated faster and more efficiently via text (like interviews). A transcription would be appreciated.

Transcripts are also more fun for cut-n-paste his answers and provide commentary. I look forward to being able to read the transcript, or at least a summary.

Pathfinder is widely seen as 3.75 or "what 4 should have been" or however you wanna phrase it. I happen to like Pathfinder and despite my noted ability to complain about almost anything, I find nothing to complain about WRT Pathfinder. Any comments about that in the video? It would be pretty cool if the newly released 5.0 or whatever it'll be called would just be "eh F-it we'll just license Paizo's core rulebook, slap on some new cover art, and call it a day". Kind of like if MS Windows 2013 turned out to be a Ubuntu boot disk.

Pathfinder is for the most part a sideways step for 3.5. It fixed a couple things and did away with a whole lot of broken splat... but it didn't even fix all the major known flaws (gate is the same as it ever was for instance) and it's busy breaking casters with it's own broken splat already though, with the summoner and the bouncing/persistent metamagic rods for instance. Also it failed to learn the lessons from some of the later 3.5 splat such as Tome of Battle and Magic Item Compendium, both flawed book

it didn't even fix all the major known flaws (gate is the same as it ever was for instance)

I would say that it hies to the universal D&D flaws, thus retaining the core D&D feel. If you change enough of those, you wind up with an actual different game, not a progression within the same family. Of course, that's not a bad choice, but it would have resulted in a radically different end result that would have to seek a new audience. At least part of Pathfinder's appeal is that it's "a better D&D than D&D".

Making Gate only work on outsiders which are extra-planar on the material plane is not going to change the core D&D feel... the classical use is to gate in high level Demons and Devils, which it would still be able to do. Allowing them to resist the control won't change the feel either.

Just getting in to Pathfinder, after being away from D&D since early 80's. Daughter is now interested in PnP role playing so off we go. I picked up the Core Rulebook a couple months ago, to get a handle on things and um, uh, this is pretty complicated. I say this as someone who has created and run Hero and GURPS campaigns, back in the 90's. Finally broke down and got the kid the beginners box (/rationalization) and the simplified instructions and workflow process descriptions are much clearer. Now the

I do hold a special place in my heart for computer game tools. Wrote my first dice roller on a TRS-80 and my first character created/db on my Ti 99/4a (still runs but need to munge up video adapters for tv). I started with Pathfinder by putting together a character db that would do the heavy lifting on modifiers and such. Man, rules have expanded! Still is fun and Wife can't complain I'm hanging out at the pub.

With the advent of 4th Edition, almost 10 years worth of direct effort from Wizards of the Coast (and almost 4 times as much effort from supplemental systems) was jettisoned in favor of an easier system that would allow for more quickly moving games. I was a very devoted fan of 4th edition (No reason to carry around a wheeled suitcase of rule books/supplements if you only need 1~2 that can go in a backpack. With the re-introduction/repackaging of nearly the same rules over and over again (Core books, Extra Handbooks, Monster Manuals, Essentials, Vaults, Compendiums) there were only 2 ways of keeping up with all the material. Become a professional D&D player with an entire bookcase dedicated to the rulebooks, or subscribe to the Insider where you could download the new rulesets.

My Question is this: After the merchandise bloat that occurred in 4th edition what plans does Wizards of the Coast have to combat the significant buy in to play at a decent level?

It depends on the players, really. If everyone knows their characters and discusses strategy with each other, fights go by very quickly and everyone feels extremely heroic. The major hangups tend to be when players haven't been paying attention and re-read their powers every round. Fighters can no longer say "I attack" for the entirety of their turn.

As a DM, these were the things that seemed most unbalanced to me in v2:1) Rangers and their damn ambidexterity2) Fireballs from hidden positions ("Can I shuffle-cast so that my last movement is beyond the wall?")3) Strength damage bonuses on missle weapons ("Screw archery or swordplay, imagonna load up on 50 lightweight daggers.")4) Character attribute selection + no penalties for low charisma, intelligence, or wisdom for non-spellcasters

Character attribute selection + no penalties for low charisma, intelligence, or wisdom for non-spellcasters

Anyone who tried playing a character with charisma below 6 in my games got ran out of town by the locals for looking like some kind of monster. Dealing with low-int and low-wis fighter in RP is a lot harder (and yeah, the save penalties are pretty much the only in-game rules that apply, and most of the people I was playing with thought that playing a hallucinating character was a trip;). I basically

players should not be locked out of large swathes of gameplay and RP experience simply because they have a low score in some stat

No, but they're going to have to deal with the consequences of that score. Otherwise, why bother with the score at all? Mine did so by chaining the freak up and pretending to be a travelling troupe. With a strength of 18/64 (funny what you remember when its a power of two) it didn't bother him one bit.

As for me being lousy, maybe I was, everyone had fun though, which was kind o

I disagree with no strength bonuses on missile attacks. How fast can pitchers in MLB throw? I guess it depends on the weapon. Obviously crossbows wouldn't be affected by strength.

In our 2nd ed campaign we've recently implemented a new tactic underground.
We call it "Wall of Fireball". This is where the Druid casts Stone Shape in a corridor creating a wall approx. 6" thick with a hole just large enough to cast Fireball through. Yes, there were a few miscalculations the first few times we tried this, and characters paid the price(Blowback through the casting hole, Oxygen consumed in smaller areas, etc). The DM didn't like it at first, but after significant research into what both spells can do, he allowed it.

Does it "break the games balance". Not really, and players will always look for ways to use spells, items, skills, etc; to master a situation. Several times during the casting of the Stone Shape our adversaries would hear the spell being cast and attack. Sometimes we're able to Silence the area in front of where the Stone Shape will be cast to counter that, which doesn't always work, so this tactic isn't foolproof, just fun to use sometimes.

But they should be ranked by strength. If a bow gets damage bonuses for being made for a high strength user, but that same high strength user can't pull a crossbow without using a crank or lever, why does the crossbow only do 1d4 damage? Crossbows in AD&D should be considered strength 19 specialty bows. Keep the 1d4, but add the strength bonus. The rate of fire should compensate for everyone and his mother getting the damage bonus (and explain why such a weak weapon costs so much).

I had lots of fun playing 2nd edition, don't even want to think about the money I spent on it.
but when i got older and started thinking about mechanics i realized the class system was totally broken. i think 3rd brought in the kind of power-gaming min/maxing that was the natural conclusion of a class based system, what little i heard about 4th sounded like "diablo the rpg"
if the next one is class-less, i might check it out. let me clarify, classes as starting templates are great; but afterwards progres

Sorry, but nothing there is a problem in any way what so ever.
Every single one of those can be dealt with with better fight balance, and role playing.

Not #3; The only way to prevent #3 is to nix multiple attacks for specializing in hurled weapons or limit strength bonuses to the minimum strength needed to wield the weapon in question. Or by ordering your players what they can and can't specialize in.

Why was this even posted? Amateur Hour on Slashdot apparently.
We can't even hear the damned questions - just extended silence while Mearls listens to a question (apparently on the phone) that we can't hear..
It's not even a video, its an audio-cast with a static image embedded. And the whole damned thing cuts out mid-sentence at 10 mins.

I playtested D&D Next this last weekend, and enjoyed it a lot. It's nothing like 4e, whatsoever. The mechanics go back to 3e, but are even simpler. Skills are simpler, there was no need for a battlemat, and we enjoyed 6 combat encounters in under 3 hours, and plenty of roleplaying. I encourage all D&D fans to check it out, if they ever played AD&D, 3e, or 4e. AD&D players will find it more balanced, and bereft of THAC0 insanity. 3e players will like the skill simplification, and overall feel of the mechanics. 4e players will... be glad to get rid of 4e's powers, forced movement, positioning, Opportunity Attacks, and all other combat clutter.

Something similar to attacks of opportunity will almost certainly be back... attacks of opportunity were introduced in 3e because of the way turns were played got changed from AD&D, making disengaging too easy. Something which is as applicable to 5e as it was to 3e.

Why bother? They're just reacting to Paizo eating their lunch. And have finally figured out that what the fans wanted was 2nd-Edition/3rd-Edition, which has been available as Pathfinder for what 3 years now (Aug.2009). Pathfinder Core Rulebook, $31.49 [amazon.com], #4 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Gaming.

A few years back, WoTC pulled ALL of their PDFs of the books for sale. Compare that to Paizo, if you buy directly from them they give you the hardcover AND the PDF.
Heck if we look a little closer at Amazon's top selling gaming books, many of the v3.5 books are still in the top 40 (#19. Players Handbook 3.5). It's also worth noting that most 3.5 D&D Books/Supplements/Modules can be used with Pathfinder with little (to no) modification at all. Thus all that money one might of spent on 3.0 and/or 3.5 wont be wasted.

Further, with D&D 4+ WoTC changed the OGL to severely restrict any other company from publishing supplements for D&D, whereas (again) Pathfinder kept the original OGL from 3.0/3.5 which allows ANYONE to create content for Pathfinder.

Not to mention the other benefits of OGL. Not just for suppliments, but for the benefit's of web searchable rules. Software character generators etc... In 3.5 if a DM wanted to look something up, d20srd.org was awesome, as long as it was in one of the core rulebooks. If one of your players wants to use something from anything non-core if the DM doesn't own the book then the DM has to borrow the book to actually confirm the legitimacy and that the player is understanding it right etc... Pathfinder, well I ca

AD&D players will find it more balanced, and bereft of THAC0 insanity. 3e players will like the skill simplification, and overall feel of the mechanics. 4e players will... be glad to get rid of 4e's powers, forced movement, positioning, Opportunity Attacks, and all other combat clutter.

How can you speak for all these classes of players?

I, as (currently) a 4e player, really don't want to get rid of 4es powers (Yay! Less options! And a return to Vancian casting!), forced movement and positioning are crucial for a tactical game, and OAs are essential for making a defender actually defend. That said, my group plays D&D for tactical skirmish combat, because really, that's what it does. If we want a roleplay-heavy game, we use a different system. D&D has been a combat game with roleplay

I tried 3.5 and was disappointed and have stayed with 1.5-2.5 variants since. WoTC really just want people to buy new products every development cycle... Not modules or things that would add to an existing rule set, but whole new libraries of books, etc;

However, my read problem with the WoTC versions of the game are that they are too OTT and video-game-esque, with "be everything/do everything" characters, with more skills, powers and abilities than your typical Marvel Superhero. It ruined it. 1.5-2.5

I thought 3rd Edition was interesting; 3.5 not so much. Although if you looked at Feats in 3.5 (physical/combat ones) anyways -- many of the modifiers aren't much different than a 2nd-Edition Warrior with a weapon proficiency specialist (+2/+4). Where the system really loses it (completely) is all the compendium/sourcebooks that keep adding classes and additional feats. You wind up with every little insignificant thing becoming a "Feat"... which leads players to only focus on playing with and using abiliti

I have to say, I don't care for the 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons. My introduction to it included an iron-fisted GM who wanted people in each role and forced us to take on roles we didn't particularly care for. Being from the school where the GM works with what the players show up with, this just stuck in my craw.

I am enjoying the heck out of Pathfinder, though. The game can be played with two books, which lowers the barrier to entry. It's compatible with a system I was already familiar with and gener

It's not just the crappy GM - I did read up on the system ahead of time.

My major issue is that, philosophically, the game pushes players into roles (tank, dps, healer) which is the same explicitly-stated breakdown as an MMO. The designers want to pigeonhole players into neat little boxes and the everything about 4th Ed follows from that standpoint. To me, it feels like an MMO on paper.

I also have a huge problem with the moneygrabbing aspect of it. Yes, Paizo, to a certain extent is doing the same thing, but

the problem is not good imagination, the problem is to hold the universe consistent enough over time as you make your own details. I found it much easier to buy 1 or 2 additional campaign ruleset and let my imagination run rampant. The core stay then consistent.

For those commenting that there is too much art and fluff, too many books to buy, etc. that's the whole point. Hasbro wants to design a game that will sell the maximum number of books. OD&D could be played with just a few dollars invested by one person, the DM. That's just the model that Hasbro does NOT want to emulate.

Ah, 4th edition. You tried so hard, and you largely succeeded. You gave healers something to do other than cast heal spells every turn, and a day of dungeoneering was able to continue past the first battle instead of everyone going, "The cleric's used up his spells - we're going back to base!"

You gave defensive builds a place in the world without making them boring. You took away a wizard's level 1 crossbow and gave him all the fireballs he wanted. You gave every class something to do other than basic melee attacks. You made characters interesting right from level 1 instead of forcing people to pray for an interesting character 10 levels down the road.

You took away multiclassing, and there was a gnashing of munchkin teeth, but you gave us arcane swordsmen and holy assassins and psychic healers. You broke up the age-old racial tradition of just elves, humans, and dwarves by sticking tieflings, dragonborn, goliaths, and devas into the main books. You got rid of prestige classes, those wonky things that forced people into specific build types, and instead gave us multiple builds for the base of a class and paragon paths for later on. Your flavor was more focused on the character than on the class min/maxing.

But, in your certain rush to fix everything that was wrong with D&D, you forgot the feel. You felt that you could discard the very makeup of the game and craft something new from scratch. Despite the interesting things that happened to a new character, your demand for balance forced you to keep everyone the same beyond level 1. While many people rallied behind you, you split the community as the players who had been in the game for years threw up their hands in disgust and went to a fork of your previous system, preferring an imperfect system that felt more like something from their youth and less like those infernal MMORPGs.

I've seen the playtest, and at first glance it looks like something that tries to bring the two groups together. But the PnP RPG faces a diminished audience from the outset, what with kids all distracted by their new-fangled machine, and the audience that you drove away has come to call you a heretic and isn't bound to return even if you pander to them again. Godspeed to you, Wizards, but I fear there's not much more you can do.

Yes, because games are something that only children do. Especially games that use a significant amount of math and copious amounts of (admittedly often too) complicated rules. Games that encourage out of the box thinking. Games where you can include complex scenarios - and be able to handle them in any way you choose, assuming you are alright with the consequences. Not limited to combat, games with older players often include politics, economics, religion, and other social issues.

I know you're just trolling, but there's far more to pen and paper RPGs than many people think.

I'd take a half-assed PnP RPG game over an incredible computer RPG any day. Why? Because the computer gives me a very limited set of choices and makes a lot of assumptions. If I want to do X, and it isn't coded into the game, then I can't even attempt to do X. Not so in PnP games.

Oh, I agree. Worst case scenario, it should be treated as a non-proficient weapon maybe with extra penalties for being unbalanced, but in OD&D, there is no such thing (fighters are proficient in all weapons). If your DM is a rules-lawyer, you're SOL.

One trick I learned from one of the original few D&D-ers: when a player tries anyhting oddball, just "OK, roll a d20". Only a small range of results will ever made you figure out what the rule was; usually the result will be obvious from the die roll without haveing to think about a rule.

Heh. best gaming moment ever for me was in a game of Paranoia. I'd brought superglue and rope, and we needed to rescue someone.

Superglue on one end of rope, toss to ceiling. Super glue along inside of arm. Super glue other hand to end of rope. Dots of super glue on toes of boots.

Swoop down and grab (with glue ready arm) the guy we needed to save. Continue on swing up to ceiling (I was given push to help move faster), toes glued to ceiling. Guy we needed to rescue away from bad guys, his arms pinned

3.5 is saturated with too many rules and variants. WotC should focus on new sourcebooks and adventure modules. No new rules, classes, etc.

That is the nature of anything that is constantly under development. You start out with a product... and a question, "But, how do I x?", then an update comes out to answer that question. But of course that makes the product just a little bit more complicated. One more rule to read and apply. One more part with another set of instructions. Whatever.
d&d rules, computer program, car, tax code, constitution, family... life. They all get more complicated

Earlier D&D editions were hardly great - IMO, all editions had serious problems. I just started playing 4 and actually quite like it so far, but haven't played it enough to really judge it. It does, however, have a more epic feel where you start and you seem reasonably competent rather than building up from very weak characters with no power to a godlike beings. My group is more roleplayers, so really we don't get into dungeons all that often - it is more about working toward some goal (often political - for instance, we spent 4 years of realtime and about 20 in gametime usurping a kingdom by building up a false champion).

3.0/3.5 if you didn't design your leveling from the beginning for your specialty class, you were screwed. You have to point bash, and that takes the fun out of feats - your character is basically fully designed from the start or worthless later on and also makes feats practically worthless - you may as well give 3 choices and then fix the rest based on those choices and not bother printing the rest.

1.0-2.0 you could role crappy and have 11 hit points at 11th level. Most 11th level monsters would kill you in 1 hit. Don't laugh - I made it to level 5 and had 5 HP on a wizard once (game ended, but I spent a lot of time bleeding to death in that one), and level 8 and had 10HP on a thief. Thief died in a claw-claw-bite after a spectacular backstab on a Troll that left it with 1HP - it turned around (ignoring the half ogre fighter in front of it) and claw did 12HP, claw did 11HP, bite did critical 34HP (we were playing -10HP to death and DM decided troll ripped both arms off and then bit off my head... and was chewing it when the half ogre clobbered it for 20 more damage "killing" it). My replacement character was given max hits but was one level below the rest of the party (this was the DM's "death penalty").

Low level D&D wizards sucked. Not as much as the Rolemaster elementalist with first level spell "boil water", but cast one magic missile and have to sleep 8 hours really sucks (and that is about all I got rolling 3D6 and not playing with a point bash DM that let me roll 4D6-1die for stats where I may have additional spells). When the DM gives extra experience for combat you can't participate in because you are out of spells, it sucks even more. Then they make the experience curve worse for Wizards.

In first and second edition, multiclassing was cool early on, especially if you were working around the wizard's cast a spell and need to sleep 8 hours, but made the midgame difficult (late game was sometimes OK, especially if one class was wizard and got 4th and 5th level wizard spells). Human changing class had less of an impact later on, especially if they just put in 3 levels or so to get some beneficial thief skills and switched to something else.

In first and second edition you could have an unplayable starting character. The worst I ever rolled had 4 threes and a max stat of 6 (my D6s are cursed, I'm pretty sure). I rolled a character not much better than that in Call of Cthulhu (max stats were 8 and 9, most were between 3 and 6) and not only was he playable, he got the nickname deadeye after the GM penalized him for being drunk (it was by prescription) and then rolling 1s and 2s on percentile dice for critical hits in several sessions.

Personally I didn't like halflings or to some extent dwarves in most of the released versions (not sure about 4.0 because I rolled my race randomly and it wasn't dwarf or halfling). Dwarves were pretty much pigeon-holed into being fighters or clerics, but halflings were worse, being pretty much useless as anything but thief.

1.0-2.0 and maybe 3/3.5 low level wizards/sorcerers suck and you spend most of your time doing nothing (I never played a wizard/sorcerer in 3/3.5, and again didn't play either much, as I was in a long running Rolemaster game and our group fell apart shortly after that due to life happening and we're jus

Whilst I don't have my dusty Rolemaster books in front of me, I'm quite certain you couldn't do anything remotely combat effective with Boil Water. Of your "creative ideas", the only one that would be allowed by the rules would be boiling the water, then throwing it at someone. However, it would probably be more effective to just attack with your weapon instead.

And saying that getting shafted by bad stat rolls is a "challenge" is just a cop out.

I think 1.0-2.0 Wizards were expected to fight in melee, and as it became pointless for them to engage in it, their spells would start taking over, although this mostly only true if you were able to get enough combat spells learned for each level. I would have preferred that 3.0 was more about fixing the issues of the earlier edition (and hopefully not shoe horn in fixes like max HP at first level) and less about the power character building mechanic. When people started telling me I needed to take a level

Sounds like your problem was the DM, not the actual rules. Most DMs allow rerolls of '1' on a HP roll. Most DMs also use one of the alternative stat rolling systems rather than forcing you to live with the exact three die that you rolled for a particular stat.

I've had lots of great gaming experiences, with many different editions of the rules. In my experience, the really good GM's learned to adjust how things worked in their games, one way or another, to compensate for the quirks of, or problems with, the official rules.

For example, one way to deal with the problem of low dice rolls is to award bonus hit points every so often to characters that get a lot of combat experience. After all, learned combat survivability is really what the hit point concept is supp

only 49.99
yup the borked the whole game allowing a lot a crap and it jsut keeps dumming it down more and more , until your dog also can buy a copy and play......

Quite the reverse. OD&D was nice because the game was easy to learn and allowed for quick resolution of most things (except wars; I ended up writing my first big program to handle War Machine rules and edited War Machine rules for use with 2nd Ed AD&D).